Supreme Court Allows Social Media Age Check Law for Now (2)

The US Supreme Court has rebuffed the country’s biggest social media platforms, letting Mississippi enforce a law for now that will impose age-verification and parental-consent requirements while the legal fight goes forward.

The justices on Thursday turned away a request from NetChoice, a trade association that represents Meta Platforms Inc.’s Facebook and Instagram, Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube and Elon Musk’s X Corp. The group had asked to keep the law on hold while litigation goes forward.

No justice dissented from the order. Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote separately that while he thought the Mississippi law likely is unconstitutional and violates First Amendment speech rights, at this stage the social media platforms didn’t show they would face severe enough harms while the court considers the full merits of the case.

Read More: Meta Clashes With Apple, Google Over Age Check Legislation

“Although we’re disappointed with the court’s decision, Justice Kavanaugh’s concurrence makes clear that NetChoice will ultimately succeed in defending the First Amendment,” Paul Taske, co-director of NetChoice Litigation Center, said in a statement. “This is merely an unfortunate procedural delay.”

MaryAsa Lee, a spokesperson for the Mississippi attorney general’s office, said in a statement that they “are grateful for the court’s decision to leave Mississippi’s law in effect while the case proceeds in a way that permits thoughtful consideration of these important issues.”

Mississippi is one of at least a dozen states that since 2023 have enacted laws restricting access by minors to social media platforms. NetChoice is pressing 10 lawsuits and so far has mostly secured favorable rulings in the lower courts.

In the Mississippi case, US District Judge Halil Suleyman Ozerden blocked the 2024 law from being enforced against nine platforms operated by NetChoice members. Ozerden said the measure, which restricts people who try to open accounts, probably violated the Constitution’s free speech guarantee.

The New Orleans-based 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals then put Ozerden’s ruling on hold, clearing the way for the law to take effect and prompting NetChoice to turn to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court earlier this year upheld a Texas law that requires porn sites to verify user age.

In 2024, the court declined to make a definitive ruling on Texas and Florida laws that would restrict the editorial discretion of the largest social media companies. The justices kicked the cases back to the lower courts to look more closely at how the laws would apply.

The latest case is NetChoice v. Fitch, 25A97.

(Updated with comments from NetChoice, Mississippi attorney general’s office.)

To contact the reporters on this story:
Greg Stohr in Washington at gstohr@bloomberg.net;
Zoe Tillman in Washington at ztillman2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Elizabeth Wasserman at ewasserman2@bloomberg.net

Sara Forden

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